Nutley's Ray Cetrulo stayed atop of the Essex County scoring list
with his four-touchdown performance Saturday against Barringer and broke a
70-year old school record while the talented senior running back was at it.

Cetrulo scored 28 points in the 45-0 victory, giving him 145
to break the former single-season record of 144 set in 1939 by Frank Cardinale.
Cetrulo will have more opportunities to add to his record with regular-season
contests left against Shabazz and Belleville and at least one NJSIAA playoff
game in North Jersey, Section 2, Group 3.

Having missed almost all of the 28-7 loss to Columbia Oct.
17, Cetrulo is essentially averaging 24.2 points a game. That puts him on pace
to break the Essex County single-season mark of 206 set two seasons ago by Mike
Canfora of Verona.

COLUMBIA NEEDS SOME `SPECIAL’ ATTENTION

Columbia had an eight-game winning streak snapped Saturday
by West Essex, 15-12, and perhaps its biggest flaw exposed that game, according
to head coach Dave Curtin.

``Our special teams hurt us. We’ve been telling them that
all year that it was going to cost us,’’ Curtin said. ``Hopefully, now it gets
their attention because we’ll have to be better than this for the
post-season.’’

Columbia (7-1) had taken a 6-0 lead just 1:02 into the game,
but gave it back 16 seconds later when Mike Cimilluca blew through coverage for
an 88-yard kick return for a score, followed by Ryan McCormack’s PAT for a 7-6
lead.

Columbia did not improve on special teams as the game went
on even though the Cougars played very well in just about every other area.
They had a PAT attempt blocked, failed on a two-point conversion pass and saw
two punts go for only 20 and 19 yards, respectively. That kind of thing will
not bode well for the North Jersey, Section 2, Group 4 playoffs.

``We have work to do,’’ Curtin said. ``We have to pick it up
on Monday and go from there.’’

Denzel Nieves and Demetrius Cooper scored for Columbia and teammates Walik Cotton, Hadrian Matthews, Chidozie Diala, Sebastian Pinkney and Jared Williams all played well on defense.

WEST SIDE DEFENSE DELIVERS TEAM TO PLAYOFFS

Newark West Side’s defense was brilliant one week ago against Bloomfield,
holding the Bengals to 84 total yards and allowing only one touchdown. But
Bloomfield’s defense had created a TD of its own and sent the Roughriders to a
heartbreaking, 13-12 loss and putting its post-season dreams in jeopardy.

With that in mind, West Side figured it had to be even
stingier against Montclair Saturday. The Roughriders pulled out a 21-0 win to
secure a playoff spot in North Jersey, Section 2, Group 3.

And that was despite West Side’s not having three two-way
starters who had to miss the Montclair game for personal reasons. But these are the types of obstacles that head coach Brian Logan and his excellent staff are always confronted with. There are issues in the inner city that most suburban coaches could never even comprehend.

Sophomore quarterback Keith Foster led the West Side offense
by completing seven-of-nine passes for 142 yards and a touchdown, a 37-yard
pass to Juwan Reaves. The defense was powered by linebackers Jamil Edwards (13 tackles)
and Eric Cohen (10), nose tackle Onique Simpson and backs Raafiq Jones and
Edgar Ruiz. Ruiz, a scrappy junior, also ran for a TD to send West Side to its
third victory in four games.